Geologists will soon have a set of software tools that can automatically correlate hundreds of stratigraphic tops that will encompass thousands of well logs. The new approach – a software Python package, ChronoLog – will potentially change how such compilations are done.

They might have to invent a new designation for the Anadarko Basin: “super-super basin.” An extraordinarily deep basin, it towers far above the standard definition of a Super Basin – a basin containing multiple reservoirs and source rocks with cumulative production of at least 5 billion barrels of oil equivalent, and future production potential of more than 5 billion boe. The Anadarko has all that and more.

Fossils and microfossils can be used to determine information about evaporites as well as carbonates and clastics. This is an area that is growing in importance. Join Susan Nash for an interview with Gil Machado, Ph.D. from the University of Lisbon who discusses salt biostratigraphy and its new usefulness.

Some 257 people gathered at the beautiful new Hilton Hotel in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea in the last week of February 2020 to attend the first AAPG/EAGE Papua New Guinea Petroleum Geoscience Conference and Exhibition. The theme for the conference was, “PNG’s Oil and Gas Industry Maturing Through Exploration Development and Production.”

Joshua Rosenfeld’s article in the April EXPLORER issue’s Historical Highlights provides an interesting compilation of observations selected to support an unproven hypothesis: that the large influx of Paleogene Wilcox sandstones in the Gulf of Mexico can be linked to a major evaporative drawdown of the basin, loosely aligned with and possibly triggering the Paleocene-Eocene thermal event. We offer our observations based on decades of oil industry experience working the Wilcox play, more than 55 peer- reviewed academic papers and one book on Gulf of Mexico sedimentary basin.

The Rocky Mountain Section of AAPG is pleased to announce the winners of its Presentation Awards for the section’s 2019 Annual Conference which was held in Cheyenne, Wyo. The Presentation Awards are given to those who present the best technical papers at the annual meeting. Authors gave more than 125 oral and poster presentations on the geology of the Rocky Mountain region at the Cheyenne meeting. Judging on technical merit and presentation determined the winners.

It all started in 2002, when Unocal revealed that its Trident-1 well had found 400 meters of 70-percent net Lower Wilcox Formation sand in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico, about 400 kilometers beyond the contemporaneous shelf break offshore south Texas. Art Berman and I gazed at a GOM activity map and pondered how that amount of sand could have been deposited so far out into the basin. Our working hypothesis was that this sand deposit was due to a drop in base level, but we also knew that the worldwide sea level was not in decline at that time. A log of the nearby Shell Great White well shows that this sand deposition began suddenly and ended suddenly. This was also puzzling, since we were trained to expect gradational coarsening-upward bedding during regression and fining-upward during transgression, rather than the sharp contacts we were seeing. Sudden avulsion of a major river in a deltaic environment could produce something like this, but how could it happen far beyond the shelf edge?

The history of the Permian Basin reads like a detective novel in reverse. Geoscientists know how the story turns out. They’re trying to determine exactly how it started. Robert Stern, a professor of geosciences at the University of Texas at Dallas, thinks he and a group of fellow scientists have solved one important part of the mystery. Stern. “We know oil is limited by the nutrients. Oil just doesn’t suddenly appear,” he said. That raises the question, “How did all those nutrients get there?”

Gil Machado is a Petroleum Exploration Geologist with a Ph.D in stratigraphy and source rock characterization. Gil's presentation 'Reducing Uncertainty and Increasing Chances of Success Using Biostratigraphy', will explore the role of biostratigraphy in the exploration workflow. Several success cases from around the World will be detailed, showing the uses of this discipline for sedimentation age determination, paleoenvironmental interpretation and source rock characterization. Join Gil Machado via Zoom on June 10 at 12:00 GMT+1

Visiting Geoscientist Juan Pablo Lovecchio reviews general aspects of rifting, rifts and passive margin formation and evolution through time, as well as elements of petroleum system development. Join Juan Pablo Lovecchio via Zoom on June 30 at 18:00 GMT-6.

Visiting Geoscientist Mauricio Guizada provides an overview of general structural geology of the Andes, with a focus on the Central Andes. His talk covers topics related to onshore exploration, G&G methods in exploration and risk analysis. Join Mauricio Guizada via Zoom on June 23 at 17:00 GMT-6.

Visiting Geoscientist Mauricio Guizada provides an overview of general structural geology of the Andes, with a focus on the Central Andes. His talk covers topics related to onshore exploration, G&G methods in exploration and risk analysis. Join Mauricio Guizada via Zoom on June 23 at 14:00 GMT-6.

Visiting Geoscientist Susan Morrice shares her personal experience and insight in this talk about opportunities for geoscientists. “Geoscientists have advantages ... They are Time Travellers and have open minds. Bringing this creativity and innovation to your company or starting your own! Challenging times bring silver linings!”

This online short course is designed to provide a geologic perspective of unconventional reservoirs to both geoscientists and non-geoscientists. By completing the course participants will have a better understanding of the depositional environments of unconventional reservoirs, when and where source rocks formed in the geologic record, the basics of sequence stratigraphy, and more.

Biostratigraphy is a fundamental discipline in petroleum exploration and development as it provides information on sedimentation ages, paleoenvironmental settings and source rock potential. This course will cover the main fossil groups used in commercial biostratigraphy, their temporal and spatial distribution, the contexts in which they occur and how they are used to provide solutions to geological and technical problems.

During this course, participants will gain the foundations for understanding and predicting the geometry, connectivity, and permeability trends of fluvial reservoir systems at the scale of boreholes, fields, and basins. A full range of topics needed to identify, correlate, and interpret fluvial reservoirs and encasing non-reservoir units will be covered.

Trip leader(s): Josep Anton Muñoz, Pablo Granado and Eduard Roca
The aim of this 2-day field trip is the recognition of the key structural features of a fold and thrust belt detached on salt that has resulted from the inversion of a previous passive margin. To achieve this objective, some of the key and most spectacular localities of the southern Pyrenees have been selected along the ECORS-Pyrenees transect. This is a reference cross-section provided that for many years a huge amount of geological and geophysical data sets has been collected and integrating into a kinematic model of the South-Pyrenean fold and thrust belt. Subsurface data (well logs and seismic sections) will be combined with field observations. One of the main characteristics of the southern Pyrenees is the preservation of the synorogenic sediments since the earlier stages of deformation, which not only provide time constraints but also allow us discussion of kinematics of fault-related folds and thrust systems. Finally, the mild contractional deformation permits deciphering the initial geometry of the rift system and the salt structures that configure the structural grain of the passive margin before the inversion, allowing discussion of the role that these structures play during the fold and thrust belt development.
Itinerary: (day by day details of the trip)
Day 1
Stop 1.1: The South-Pyrenean thrust front. Sant Llorenç de Montgai
Structure of a frontal thrust system and related unconformities. Out of sequence thrusts and synorogenic sediments.
The frontal thrust system of the South-central Pyrenees has been detached into the Triassic evaporites and involves a thin Mesozoic succession. It is characterized by an emergent thrust system during the sedimentation of upper Eocene and lower Oligocene continental sediments. Frontal thrusts were progressively buried by conglomerates, triggering a break-back thrusting sequence and the development of out-of-sequence thrusts bringing together strongly different Mesozoic successions, such as the Montroig thrust in the picture.
Stop 1.2: The Ager basin and the Montsec thrust sheet. Fontllonga
The Ager basin in the footwall of the Montsec thrust.
The Montsec thrust sheet developed from the Paleocene to the Early Eocene as recorded by continental to shallow marine sediments deposited in its footwall (Ager basin) as well as in the Tremp-Graus piggy-back basin. The lower Eocene sediments of these basins grade westward into the slope succession filling the Ainsa basin at the footwall of the Montsec thrust.
Stop 1.3: The frontal structure of the Montsec thrust sheet. Ametlla (optional: Montrebei)
Fault-propagation fold related with the inversion of Early Cretaceous extensional faults and growth deltaic sediments in the footwall syncline.
The Montsec thrust sheet involves the northern part of the Upper Cretaceous foreland basin characterised by a strong subsident turbiditic trough at the footwall of the Bóixols thrust. These turbidites grade southward into a carbonatic platform that constitutes the backbone of the Montsec Range (main ridge and cliff of the pictures). Underneath the Upper Cretaceous carbonates, some Early Cretaceous extensional faults are preserved in the hanging wall of the Montsec thrust, but others have controlled the development of a hanging wall frontal anticline. The geometry of this anticline as well as the structure of the growth sediments in the footwall Ager syncline are visible in the field. The subthrust geometry will be discussed integrating surface observations and the available seismic and well data.
Overnight in Tremp
Day 2
Stop 2.1: The Sant Corneli-Bóixols anticline
Inversion of the rift margin
The Sant Corneli-Bóixols anticline is the most prominent frontal structure of the Bóixols thrust sheet in the central Pyrenees. This fold trends east–west and crops out for greater than 40 km along strike. The Sant Corneli-Bóixols anticline involves a thick Mesozoic succession detached on top of Triassic evaporites. The prefolding sequence consists of up to 5 km of prerift, synrift, and postrift carbonates ranging in age from Jurassic to Upper Cretaceous. Synfolding Upper Cretaceous sediments start with the upper Santonian carbonates and continue with a succession of Campanian and Maastrichtian marls and turbidites.
The Sant Corneli–Bóixols anticline is an example of an inversion fold developed along the rift margin of the Lower Cretaceous basin. Its geometry is related with the inverted extensional system. In particular, the three-dimensional geometry, including the saddles between culminations, is inherited from the previous transfer faults of the segmented rift margin.
Available seismic data and 3 exploratory wells constrain the geometry at depth.
Stop 2.2: The synororgenic Paleogene conglomerates
Inverted Lower Cretaceous basin and Eocene-Oligocene synorogenic conglomerates at Collegats gorge.
Stop 2.3 (optional): The Sopeira and Aulet minibasins. Sopeira
Minibasins developed by extensional collapse and salt evacuation during the thermal subsidence at the southern Pyrenean rift margin. Inversion of these minibasins at the early stages of Pyrenean contractional deformation during Late Cretaceous.
Additional logistic information
Transportation
Transportation will be with a small bus, assisted by minivans to have access to some of the outcrops.
Physical demand, equipment and safety
This is an easy field trip with very easy and limited hikes to get to the outcrops. Outcrops will be from main sealed roads.
Safety vests will be available, to be used by everybody of the group wherever required and asked to. There will be First Aid Kits available in each car during fieldwork.
Climate
The climate during mid-end November in the fieldwork area can be cold and rainy, although dry and sunny days may occur as well. The temperature for November in Tremp can range between 30C and 170C. Participants should be prepared in case we should encounter bad weather and you should bring warm and waterproof clothes and suitable hiking boots.

This 2-day conference brings together diverse experts working on modern and ancient turbidite, MTDs, contourite and hybrid/mixed systems in order to improve the present-day knowledge, models and predictive power.

Join us in Salzburg, the “castle of salt” and cradle of Mozart and Doppler, for a meeting aimed at bringing together different perspectives in the science of evaporite basins: from their formation to their deformation, from description and characterization to modelling. Exploratory success in evaporite-rich basins worldwide has depended on the role of evaporites as a deformable substrate, as a seal, or even as a good thermal conductor. The aim of this workshop is to improve our understanding and predictive ability by addressing evaporite systems in an integrated manner, all the way from precipitation to structuration, and exploring the multiple properties of evaporite sequences. The pre- and post-meeting field trips will also explore the salt mining heritage of the region, first exploited by the Celts 3500 years ago, and the salt-related structures of the Northern Calcareous Alps.

The AAPG Latin America & Caribbean Region and the Colombian Association of Petroleum Geologists and Geophysicists (ACGGP) invite you join us for GTW Colombia 2020, a specialized workshop bringing leading scientists and industry practitioners to share best practices, exchange ideas and explore opportunities for future collaboration.
The 2-day workshop brings together technical experts and industry leaders from Colombia and throughout the Americas to take a multidisciplinary look at future opportunities for exploration and development of Southern Caribbean Frontier Basins.

Join us for the 3rd Edition of Stratigraphic Traps of the Middle East. The Geosciences Technology Workshop (GTW) aims to build on the success of the previous two workshops the AAPG hosted on stratigraphic traps of the Middle East GTW in Muscat Oman in 2014 and 2017.
See Event Website

The carbonate sequences that were deposited in the now exhumed Tethyan Ocean influence many aspects of our lives today, either by supplying the energy that warms our homes and the fuel that powers our cars or providing the stunning landscapes for both winter and summer vacations. They also represent some of the most intensely studied rock formations in the world and have provided geoscientists with a fascinating insight into the turbulent nature of 250 Million years of Earth’s history.
By combining studies from the full range of geoscience disciplines this presentation will trace the development of these carbonate sequences from their initial formation on the margins of large ancient continental masses to their present day locations in and around the Greater Mediterranean and Near East region.
The first order control on growth patterns and carbonate platform development by the regional plate-tectonic setting, underlying basin architecture and fluctuations in sea level will be illustrated. The organisms that contribute to sequence development will be revealed to be treasure troves of forensic information. Finally, these rock sequences will be shown to contain all the ingredients necessary to form and retain hydrocarbons and the manner in which major post-depositional tectonic events led to the formation of some of the largest hydrocarbon accumulations in the world will be demonstrated.

The following short course option was developed for geology and geophysics students that have not had much exposure to how geoscience is applied in industry. It can be tailored for undergraduate juniors and seniors or graduate students. The agenda can be modified to meet specific needs and time constraints. Contact the presenter to discuss options.

This lecture will discuss the differences between carbonates and siliciclastics from their chemical composition through their distributions in time and space. Building on these fundamental differences, we will explore the challenges carbonates pose to petroleum geologists in terms of seismic interpretation, reservoir quality prediction, field development, etc. Peppered with humorous personal stories, still raging academic debates, and the heartfelt frustrations of real industry professionals, the aim is to inspire students and young professionals to rise to the occasion and embrace the reservoir rocks that petroleum geologists love to hate.